


Connective tissue

by Anuna



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Childhood Memories, Established Relationship, F/M, Hurt and comfort, Insecurities, Parental Fears, Pregnancy, rejection and abandonment issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-06
Updated: 2013-10-06
Packaged: 2017-12-28 15:32:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/993571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anuna/pseuds/Anuna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>It was strange how some things remained stubbornly painful, as if they happened yesterday.</i> </p><p>Clint remembers an event from his childhood and discovers he doesn't have a ready solution if something similar happened to his child.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Connective tissue

**Author's Note:**

> This is not the fluffiest piece of my writing, and currently it's not beta'd, so I apologize for somewhat somber tone and very possible mistakes. I always wanted to poke at Clint's insecurities, which is a tricky job to do. He's a guy who doesn't blink when Hulk shows up to fight alongside Avengers, yes, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have any insecurities at all. I don't think that a moment of weakness and soul searching equals general weakness, and I hope I did this little piece well.

_In a sense, there is no such thing as healing. From paper cuts to surgical scars, our bodies are catalogues of wounds: imperfectly locked doors quietly waiting, sooner or later, to spring back open. - Geoff Manaugh_

 

*

 

“You're thinking. I can hear you.”

Clint opened his eyes and met the glare of the digital clock on his bedside. It was too late not to be asleep and too early to get up. He sighed, shifted, and felt Natasha turn behind his back. 

“Am sorry. Can't think any quieter than I do,” he said

“Can't sleep?” she inquired and he could feel her in the dark, shifting closer until she was against his back, as much as her pregnant body would allow. He'd take what he could get, though, trusting the feeling of her hand on his shoulder, sliding up his neck. “You're tense.”

“I know,” he took a breath in vain attempt to relax. Both his muscles and his thoughts were like tight knots. 

“That party really wasn't your thing,” Natasha commented. Clint remained quiet for a moment. Even though he didn't make a single comment about the party, he wasn't surprised that she figured it out, and in his exhausted state of mind, he didn't mind it much. 

“No,” he said. Honesty was easier in darkness. He felt detached from the rest of the world, tucked away in his own pocket of the universe, wrapped in his own thoughts. It was strange for him who always knew his point of reference, but like this he felt safe enough to touch the thoughts he usually left alone. He closed his eyes, even though there was little to see around him. “Someone asked me what I thought of Great Gatsby. That was the low point, I think.” 

He could feel Natasha's lips press into his shoulder. “What did you say?”

“That I thought the book was boring.”

“Ouch.”

“I know.”

She stroked his shoulder and arm, drawing him closer. He felt his muscles relax, almost unwillingly. 

“What's on your mind?” she asked. Clint covered her fingers with his hand; small and gentle and completely deceiving when compared to his. One could look at his hands and see hard life there, but never guess her past by the look at her. 

“The boy,” he said. 

“The boy?” there was a change in her tone indicating that she couldn't follow what he meant. 

“Yeah. He's... sitting in a tree, looking at a house,” he answered. Even a thought of that memory could make his voice crack, no matter how many years he put between himself and that evening. It was strange how some things remained stubbornly painful, as if they happened yesterday. 

“Why is he doing that?” she asked, fingers closing around his arm to hold him. 

Clint stared ahead. The room was dark but his mind was miles and years away.“There's a birthday party inside. Only he... wasn't invited.”

There was silence. And then she said, “Oh, Clint,” and then was quiet for a long time. He told himself that it was long time ago, that since then he learned how to read, how to fit in or at least pretend. He was grown up, he was solid, he learned how to deal. Nobody laughed at him now. “How old were you?”

“Eleven. Twelve. I'm not sure. It was in my second foster family.” Her hand left his arm and wound around his chest, as far as she could reach. “The foster parents thought I was difficult and the people in school thought I was mean.”

“Were they right?”

“Sometimes,” he kept his voice mostly steady. “I was lonely. And sad.” 

“Sadness is hard,” she said. “Anger is easier.”

“Yes. Especially if nobody wants you around.”

“I'm sorry you remembered that,” she gave him a kiss between his shoulder blades, a kind of kiss that was meant as acceptance of everything. 

“I got over most of it. It doesn't matter to me much, not anymore. Few things make me feel like I'm at my school reunion. Like books. But -”

“But?”

He stared through the darkness toward his nightstand, there where he left _What to expect when you're expecting_ , thinking how there were things nothing could prepare you for. Not even experience, or maybe, especially not your experience. 

“What if that happens to her?” he said, drawing in on himself again, feeling the press of Natasha's stomach against his back. “If she comes home one day and she's the kid who doesn't get invited at birthdays? I can't – I don't have anything to say to her that could help her. Because none of the things I was told helped me.”

Natasha waited, quiet. He continued. “Because nothing helps. Nothing changes that.” He wiped his eyes and pressed on. “They tell you to be yourself and to do what you like, things like that. Be yourself,” he snorted. “Being yourself _is_ the problem. People say it like they forget you'd still be lonely. Eventually... you do find yourself. You find a way to be you and be okay with it. But until you do? It hurts.”

“I know,” she said, her face against his back. 

“I know you know,” he replied heavily. “I just wanted to belong. To... be talked to. Story of each orphan, I guess. It was... nothing special.”

He could feel her protest in the squeeze of her fingers and protectiveness inside her dark tone. “You are special to me.”

“I know,” he said finally. 

“Do you?” she whispered against him. 

He was going to answer when he felt a tickle of a baby kick against his back, and left the words inside his throat, unspoken. He could hear a smile in Natasha's voice. 

“That's her, you know. Saying she'll kick your ass if you keep doing this to yourself.”

It was strange, he thought, feeling happy and sad at the same time. 

“I just want to do what's right for her.”

“And you will.”

“Nat I can't -”

“Nobody can make the world perfect for her, Clint. Neither you or me. We can show her how to deal, we can give her some strength, we can even protect her for a little while. And it won't be enough,” she paused, with her hand splayed across his chest. “But I do know one thing. We'll never leave her.”

“You can't say that.”

Because everyone left. Everyone eventually had to leave, one way or another. 

“Yes I can,” she paused, and he could imagine the look on her face. “Until my last breath I'll be hers. All of me. And I know you're like that too.” 

Clint closed his eyes. Yes, he thought. 

He unfolded, turning to face her and seeing outline of her body. All the things he was and wasn't, everything he didn't have, everything that he couldn't be and in the end didn't matter brought him here. Right here. 

“That boy in the tree,” she said, laying her palm over his heart. “You could do something for him?”

He swallowed over the lump in his throat. “I... what do you mean?”

Natasha snuggled close, sliding one leg across his; warm and solid and right there. “Imagine yourself as you're now. Everything you know, everything you've done. Imagine how you'd look to him if you walked up, in your suit and gear and with your bow?“

Clint slowly smiled. He could imagine how a guy like him would look to the boy he was. Big. Strong. Kind of awesome. 

“Yeah,” he said, holding onto that sentiment in amusement. It was strange, observing what you've become through the eyes of the child you were. 

“Can you give him a hug? I'm sure he could use one. And tell him that he'll turn out all right? That he'll be amazing?”

He blinked away the prickly feeling and kissed her forehead. Natasha's hand wound around him, safe and steady, as he imagined how it would be. He'd smile, give that little guy an open look and wouldn't look away at the suspicion in his eyes. Too many have, as if they expected the child to smile back at them without any reason. He'd wait, until the vary look was gone, until curiosity showed. He'd be kind to this little man, kind and real, and wouldn't stop at the _difficult kid_ . He'd know better, because he'd seen it. He'd give him a fist bump and tell him he's smart enough and good enough. That he would be wanted and counted upon. Loved. 

Natasha's arm held him a bit tighter. 

“Hey,” he said, sniffling. “That was -”

“Pretty neat, right?” she asked and he huffed a little. 

“It was,” he said as she was wrapping herself around him, slowly and as much as her body would let her. He closed his eyes and breathed, realizing that those things that mattered the most were right here with him. It wasn't the solution. Old wounds were closed but not fixed, but for the time being it was enough.


End file.
